Photograph
by staygoldgreaser
Summary: Ten years after Johnny and Dallas's death, Ponyboy recalls and writes about Johnny while looking at a photograph of himself and Johnny.


Ponyboy sat at his desk, his eyes dry and red, his hair dirty and sticking up in every which way. His eyes were no longer letting tears fall onto his prickly, unshaven cheeks. The inhabitants of a picture that had sat in the exact same place on Pony's desk for nearly ten years were staring at him. The two boys in the picture were young; one of fourteen, the other sixteen, though they both looked fourteen. They both had dark hair, one with tan skin and the other whose was pale. The dark-skinned fellow had large, nearly black eyes, and looked as if he had been beaten too many times, or lost among a crowd once as a child. The other boy, though, had green-grey eyes, giving him a warm look. His eyes, though, did not show such a horrible past as the first, he looked as if he had been loved, though a tragedy may have struck not long before the picture was taken.

Ponyboy looked closely at the picture, then turned back to the composition notebook open on his desk.

_There was, once upon a time, a town where upper- and lower-class citizens were characterized as Socs and greasers. Socs and greasers were completely different and weren't willing to accept each other as people quite like themselves and were at constant battle, almost like a civil war among the teenagers of the town. There was no resolving it - not a single person could convince neither one group nor the other that either was no better than the other, because they knew it was untrue. Socs had money, cars, and madras. Greasers had hair grease, tennis shoes, and leather jackets. No matter who fought who and who won, it was always the Socs that came out on top._

_But one person went and changed that: Johnny._

After that, Pony stopped. He wasn't completely sure how to tell his story, or even if he should. He wanted people to know that there was a way that their lives wouldn't always be the same, but didn't want to disappoint them with what that may have brought, or what may have brought it. He didn't want to tell of three tragic deaths of people who weren't ready to go, and the people who suffered and always dreaded the nights the beloved departed entered their dreams.

Ponyboy put his pen between his teeth and sat there for a minute before he decided to continue:

_Johnny was always a small, fragile boy with dark hair, skin and eyes. His parents were abusive and his mother an alcoholic, and had never been taken very good care of by his family. He had friends, though, who stuck up for him no matter the danger, and made sure he was always safe. There were six others in the "gang": Two-Bit Mathews, Steve Randal, Dallas Winston, and the Curtises, Darry, Sodapop, and Ponyboy. The most peculiar of the bunch was Dallas Winston, who was generally referred to as Dally. He was certainly the toughest, and had been in jail numerous times. He was constantly getting into fights, and was not a person you wanted to mess with. The strangest thing about Dally was that he always seemed to treat Johnny differently; he never really got mad at him, almost like he couldn't. What hardly anyone seemed to notice was that Dally really cared for Johnny more than anyone. No one thought Dally had a heart, but he did - but only for Johnny._

_How do I know, you wonder?_

_Well, I'm Ponyboy, and Johnny was my best friend._

Pony looked back at the photograph, his eyes begging for moisture. He pushed his chair backwards and made his way into the bathroom, flushing his face with cool water. He leaned on the sink, looking into his reflected eyes. Ten years had aged him more severly than he imagined, his eyes darker than they once were and grey circles beneath his eyes. Suddenly, he wanted those ten years to disappear, all the challenges and losses they brought, and wanted to return to the age of fourteen. He wanted those bright eyes and long hair, the smooth face and fit body. He wanted his best friend back, and he wanted still to live with his family, with his brothers. He wanted to stay home that night, instead of going to the movies with Johnny and Dallas. He wanted not to have met Cherry that night, he wanted Bob not to have been drunk. He wanted not to have liked Cherry, he wanted the Socs not to have jumped him. He wanted Johnny to have let Pony die instead.

Then, he thought, maybe it all happened for a reason.


End file.
